Category: Real Personal History
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The Swans Of The Shannon River: Limerick On A Warm Afternoon
I dropped Mariam at our hotel and drove off to find the parking lot. I made two lefts and passed two pubs, one of which was called The Sin Bin. I took note of the name. Maybe this pub had something more than pints of Guinness. I walked back to the hotel and we decided…
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Crossing The Liffey: Our First And Last Full Day In Dublin’s Fair City
I was sitting opposite my wife in the restaurant of the Arlington Hotel where we are staying. It’s just steps away from the O’Connell Street Bridge. I was making strange, odd and contorted…some would say ugly faces in her direction. She simply stared back at me. My eyes watered and I continued to wiggle my…
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68 Steps Along The Nave Of Wells Cathedral
Three hundred and sixty-five days ago, I was climbing the endless steps of Sacre Coeur in Paris. My wife was at my side. We paused on the 67th step, and, in the warm Parisian sun, we turned and looked back at the City of Lights. We kissed on that 67th step. It was my 67th…
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Yes, But Why Can’t You Go Home Again?
It’s a cliché. It’s a meme. It’s been repeated a hundred billion times by three hundred billion people. “You can’t go home again” I’ve read Thomas Wolfe’s book by the same name. It was a long time ago. I may be wrong (correct me if I am), but I do not recall Wolfe ever saying…
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Dance Like A Wave Of The Sea
I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree… –W. B. Yeats Three decades have passed since I last walked the streets of Dublin, Galway and Sligo. A great many things have changed in those years. And, a great many haven’t. The smell of peat-fires in Dublin on a December night, the blasts of…
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Digging A Grave On A Beautiful Spring Afternoon
I stood in the soft loam, nine inches below ground level, leaned against my shovel, and thought about death and insects. This is not a difficult thing to do when you’re helping to dig a grave on a day in May when the gnats and flies are biting ankles and arms. After all, it is…
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